May 9 - 5:50pm EDT   MCE Technologies on Friday said it will begin shipping a 1TB internal hard drive solution for the Apple's MacBook Pro 17-inch. The solution, which installs two half-terabyte drives and affects battery performance a bit, consists of the new MCE OptiBay SATA 500GB Optical Bay Hard Drive and an MCE MobileStor 500GB Internal SATA Hard Drive. The new MCE OptiBay SATA 500GB Optical Bay Hard Drive replaces the internal SuperDrive of the MacBook Pro 17-inch with a 500GB internal hard drive; however, the company provides a slim, portable enclosure for the internal SuperDrive, effectively converting it into a portable, bus-powered, bootable, external USB 2.0 SuperDrive able ... [full story]

April 25 - 8:00pm EDT   iSkin today announced its ProTouch silicone keyboard covers are now using Microban antimicrobial protection, which helps to inhibit odor and stains from surfacing on the products from sweat and dust. The Protouch line of protectors for the MacBook, MacBook Pro, and MacBook Air, as well as for the aluminum and older model Apple keyboards all contain the protective substance. ProTouch skins are available ranging from $25 to $35, depending on the model. [full story]

April 25 - 1:55pm EDT   The National Underground Railroad Freedom Center is launching the "Digital Backpack," which will allow visitors at the Freedom Center to utilize social networking technology, digital media production, and wireless computing in ways that empower them to create, "distribute and access a shared vision for freedom." The company has chosen Apple products to power the project: each pack contains an Apple MacBook Pro notebook computer, iPod classic with voice recorder, digital camera, HD digital camcorder and tripod. These perspectives are then captured as a digital movie, archived at the Freedom Center, and published to an iTunes channel that the Center is launching in May. [full story]

April 21 - 7:30pm EDT   Apple today released its MacBook Pro EFI Firmware Update 1.5.1, which it says provides fixes several issues to improve the stability of MacBook Pro computers. The update revises a recently-issued MBP firmware update that came alongside similar updates for most of its other Mac families, including the MacBook, MacBook Air, and iMac computers -- as well as a specific MacBook Air Bluetooth update -- and also comes with updated version of the Firmware Restoration CD 1.7. "After the firmware is successfully applied to your Mac, your Boot ROM Version will be:
 MBP21.00A5.B08 or MBP31.0070.B07," the company notes. [full story]

April 18 - 6:35pm EDT   Apple has second-generation iPod Nanos and several versions of the Santa Rosa-powered MacBook Pros on clearance in the online store. The silver 2GB iPod nano can store upwards of 500 songs, and is capable of displaying pictures, but not video content, as is the case with the third generation Nano. The iPod nanos come with Apple earphones and a USB dock cable, and are currently available from the online store for $100. [full story]

April 18 - 5:40pm EDT   Mactracker 5.0.2 (donationware) database of Mac models. The latest Apple hardware has been added along with numerous improvements to the "My Models" category in the main window. New specification entries include "Brightness" and "DPI" information (where available) for the built-in display on MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro models. The maximum supported resolution for an external display is now detailed for Mac mini, MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and PowerBook G3/G4 models. This release also fixes an issue with creating new Smart Categories. [Download - 20.8MB] Graph Paper Maker 1.9 ($20) lets you create your own custom sheets of graph paper. It is ideal for students, ... [full story]

April 14 - 12:05pm EDT   The latest Apple MacBooks are suffering from serious graphical issues, according to widespread reports. Both the basic MacBook and the MacBook Pro are said to be suffering from instances of visual corruption, in which text duplicates, documents fail to scroll completely, or animations and videos flicker; the last problem seems to primarily affect Flash or Quicktime clips viewed in a web browser. Critically, the issue appears to be independent of graphics hardware, given that basic MacBooks use integrated Intel chips while Pros use GeForce 8600M GT cards by NVIDIA. [full story]

April 8 - 6:30pm EDT   Apple today released a number of updates, including firmware updates for its MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro as well as firmware for its iMac. The Mac BookAir EFI Firmware Update 1.0, MacBook EFI Firmware Update 1.2, and Mac Book Pro EFI Firmware Update 1.5 fixes several issues to improve the stability of the notebook computers, while the iMac EFI Firmware Update 1.3 fixes several issues to improve the stability of iMac computers. Apple's Firmware Restoration CD 1.6, for its Macs, can restore the firmware of an Intel-based Macintosh computer and the company notes that restoring the firmware will reset some of the computer's preferences to defaults. [full story]

April 1 - 11:25am EDT   Profit prospects on Apple stock continue to look bright, despite the collapse of much of the American economy, says the research firm Piper Jaffray. Analyst Gene Munster contends that the company is being driven by several factors, among these a growth in its worldwide computer marketshare, which expanded from 2.4 percent in 2006 to 2.9 percent in 2007; notably, enterprise sales actually represented 70 percent of the latter figure, despite minimal effort on Apple's part. [full story]

March 31 - 8:20am EDT   Apple's new 15" MacBook Pro, based on Intel's latest Penryn processor, earned high marks from PC Magazine. In a recently published review, Editor Cisco Cheng took the new model for a test drive, benchmarking performance and feature enhancements. His conclusion - MacBook Pro is a winner. Cheng called it "one of the fastest laptops I've tested". That's high praise indeed, coming from a publication devoted to Windows PCs. [full story]

March 26 - 2:45pm EDT   ASUS' upcoming Eee PC 900 will have multi-touch features in its trackpad when it arrives on US shores, according to a new FCC filing. A user guide posted as part of the US agency's testing process reveals a trackpad with controls similar to (but simpler than) those found on the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro. Unlike most notebooks, the 900 will allow both for two-finger scrolling as well as a "pinch" gesture to zoom into photos and some documents. [full story]

March 26 - 10:05am EDT   Apple has agreed to an out-of-court settlement in a long-running lawsuit over the MacBook and MacBook Pro, writes the Chicago Tribune. Two California photographers, Fred Greaves and Dave Gatley, filed the class action suit in May of last year, over Apple's claim that the Pro could display "millions of colors." According to the filing, the reality is that Apple fakes the notebooks' color range through software dithering, and yet offers the extended color option in a Mac OS X drop-down menu, without any mention of software emulation. [full story]

March 24 - 7:10pm EDT   In brief: We have a review of the Booq Boa Slimcase, the book Take Control of iWeb '08 has shipped, an REM music video available is available now through iTunes and "Easter mEgg Hunt" hunt for Mac software participants have been announced ... We have posted a review of the Booq Boa Slimcase. The series of bags supports laptop sizes ranging from 13 to 17 inches, and fit Apple's MacBook and MacBook Pro laptops. The Boa Slimcases are available in portrait and landscape formats. The two models and three sizes per model are designed for the professional who wants to carry only the basic necessities of computing. This $115 bag fits 13 to 15" laptops, while the other more expensive ... [full story]

March 13 - 7:15pm EDT   Ecamm Network has announced the Huckleberry 3 MacBook mirror. Consisting of two acrylic mirrors and two durable mounting brackets, Huckleberry attaches to your screen to reflect the built-in camera's field of view. Instead of filming yourself, it will now film what's in front of you. The new Huckleberry 3 features an enhanced design, fits both MacBook and MacBook Pro and comes with Ecamm's iGlasses software to flip and rotate the video image. The Huckleberry costs $29 and ships worldwide. [full story]

March 13 - 11:45am EDT   Memory maker Corsair has released an unusual new RAM upgrade module, aimed exclusively at Mac owners. The company's new Mac Memory kit has been tuned explicitly for MacBooks and MacBook Pros, using a special SPD (serial presence detect) profile that Macs can exploit to self-configure for better performance. The memory has been tested in programs such as XBench, Photoshop and VMware Fusion, and is claimed to be as much as 28 percent faster than standard Mac upgrade memory. [full story]